


What’s in A Name? The POWER...

by Tenthsun



Series: Librasmile's Harry Potter Meta Essays, Notes and Fragments [5]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Analysis, Essays, Magical Theory, Meta, Metafiction, Other, Theory of Magic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-20
Updated: 2018-02-20
Packaged: 2019-03-21 13:51:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13742274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tenthsun/pseuds/Tenthsun
Summary: How the hell DID Harry survive Voldemort’s curse? I’ve never believed it was solely Lily’s sacrifice – a sacrifice any loving mother would make. In my story “As Pretty Does” I offered an alternate view but never made clear exactly how Harry was protected. This because I hadn’t figured out how. But now I have. So here is my recent epiphany on how it was done…





	What’s in A Name? The POWER...

**Author's Note:**

> _For a while now, I’ve been writing in an alternate universe that adds a new twist to the severitus genre including why Tobias apparently hated Severus (Answers to Nothing); what Dumbledore had to do with it (For the Price of My Familiar); and how that explains how Harry survived Voldemort’s killing curse (As Pretty Does)._
> 
> _**Disclaimer & Usage Note:** While the Harry Potter characters clearly belong to J.K. Rowling, the original concepts within this essay are mine and may not be used without my permission and without citing this article with my authorship made clear. Please do not archive it without asking me first and providing a link to your archive._

_They whisper high,_

_They whisper low,_

_They whisper everywhere they go,_

_The secret name that none dare say,_  

_Out loud beneath the light of day…_

\- **Oral saying from the Foremothers-**

 

**The Power is Always in the Name.  
** Religions and mythologies around the world are replete with stories of heroes and heroines changing their names after completing a rite of passage or being charged with a divine mission.  

In Harry Potter, the orphan wizard Tom Riddle changes his name to Lord Voldemort during his transformation into the penultimate dark wizard. According to J.K. Rowling, Voldemort means “flight from death” which is obviously a description of Voldemort’s quest to achieve infernal immortality.

The name Severus Snape clearly includes allusions to this character being “severe” in his treatment of Harry and his constant need to “snipe” (present tense of “Snape” perhaps?) at the boy. The name Albus is an analog to “white” which, in the Western world, is the symbol of purity and goodness. “Dumbledore” is an old English name not only for “bumblebee” but for a “hat”. Hence, Headmaster Albus Dumbledore is the white hat of goodness in the Harry Potter saga. And of course no one can be in doubt that the name “Lily” is meant to imply an innocent and angelic character. We could go on and on.

So what does the name Harry Potter mean?

I’ve never liked that name. In a story chock full of characters with evocative names like Ronald Weasley, Luna Lovegood, Neville Longbottom and Hermione Granger, the hero of the saga is landed with the thuddingly ordinary name of Harry Potter – Harry James Potter to be exact.

Harry Potter. 

_Harry Potter_ … 

**There’s just no poetry in that name, is there?** “Albus Dumbledore” bumbles and bounces along happily through a flowery meadow. “Severus Snape” slashes and stings like a razor’s edge. “Bellatrix Lestrange” chimes darkly in minor key like discordant bells. “Sirius Black” crashes through glass. And “Lucius Malfoy” is wrapped in bits of elegantly smoking brimstone. All of these names resound with music and poetry.

“Harry Potter,” on the other hand, lands like a piece of putty thrown against a glass, slowly peeling away, and plopping sadly to the floor.  

So what do we do about “Harry Potter”?

One of the joys of fan fiction is seeing how other authors’ interpretations of character diverge from canon. One of the first thing many authors do is try to insert an original (often self-modelled) character. And they typically try to make this character stand out by giving them an atypical name. This ploy frequently backfires however because the author generally gives the (usually female) original character a name like Kaylee or Jewel or Darcy.

Really?

**When I see names like these I generally flee from these fics like I’m on fire.** Why? Well, if this were a fan fic based on _Mean Girls_ or _The Bling Rin_ g, I wouldn’t have a problem. A Darcy or Kaylee would fit right in. But in a story about magic that takes place in a castle and in a wizard world that seems permanently stuck somewhere between the Dark Ages (800 – 1500 AD roughly) and World War II (1940s) at the most, none of those names makes sense.  

Fairy folklore says that when you know the true name of a person, place, or thing, you conquer it. It must do your bidding. In addition, simply saying the name of a person or entity can summon it.  

**So it seems to me that in the wizard world, Voldemort would not be the only one with multiple names.** Maybe it’s not a widespread practice. But it shouldn’t be unusual to find that there are some wizards and witches with multiple or even hidden names. And since the hidden names would be magically significant if not downright powerful, the Ministry of Magic - which MUST regulate ALL magical activity in Britain - would need to have multiple ways to register a birth in order to capture that hidden name.  After all, birth registry establishes legal identity, which is the foundation of an individual’s citizenship and/or rights. So ALL names must be registered.

Here’s how I think it could be done:

  1. **Ministry Birth Certificate** – this is simply the magical version of the British Muggle birth certificate (which Hermione would have). It was instituted around the same time that government-issued birth certificates became prevalent. In 1836, parliament passed the Births and Deaths Registration Act which required all births and deaths to be officially recorded. Registrations began in 1837. This was in the era of Queen Victoria. The General Register Office for England and Wales registers births, stillbirths, adoptions, marriages, civil partnerships and deaths.
  2. **Parish Baptismal Certificate** – this is simply the magical version of baptismal certificates that are recognized by the British authorities. I can see the Weasleys taking this approach for all of their children, including Ron. Yes, Arthur is a ministry employee. However, he is also a pureblood with a huge family and he’s proud of that. In the old days, magical births were registered via the parish baptismal certificate (although how the parish was defined is a whole OTHER matter) or privately. The aristocrats did it privately. The rest did it via the parish baptismal certificate. The Weasleys could possibly be called gentry (that’s fallen on hard times) but they are emphatically NOT aristocrats. Hence, they would resort to the parish baptismal certificate as a bow to family tradition.  
 
  3. **Private Family Registry** – this is an aristocratic practice where the heads of the family also held political power as administrative heads of their counties or other localities. As a result, registering a family member’s birth is often the same as registering it with the magistrate and thus legally enforceable. This is of course a gray area – legally shaky but enforced because of the political power behind it. For example, I’m pretty sure Draco’s birth would have been registered in this way.   



Previously, birth registrations were not as organized as this. Remember, the magical world wasn’t really rationalized until around the 1600s with the Wizard Enlightenment*. And even then, wizard births weren’t rationalized or bureaucratized. **They were registered through the** **_Name Roll_** **.**

 

**The Magic of the Name Roll**  
In the era of wild magic – the era of paganism and non-bureaucratic control – most births, when they were registered at all, were recorded via the Name Roll. These were complex documents because in this era people’s names were changed regularly for multiple reasons and through their lifetimes. They could in fact have 3, 4, 5 different names or more. Also people didn’t regularly use surnames. In addition, magical people didn’t necessarily want people to know their birth names – the ones bestowed by their mothers – because it meant you could take power over them in some way or another. The true name was often hidden. However, for community purposes, people had to be recognized in their true form. Hence, they resorted to the Name Roll.

**Name Rolls are ancient, complex, magical documents.** They are imbued with magic and record magic. _Recording_ magic is a great feat. It records the miraculous magic of birth. That is, it contains it to a certain extent. The only other thing that comes close is the private family registry. But families exist within communities. And magical communities often banded together to create great feats of magic. Hence they had to know everyone well enough in order to do it.  

**So the Name Roll involves blood magic.** It’s not nefarious. The blood comes from the mother, either at the time of birth (via the blood of childbirth) or later (via a voluntary blood donation), within the child’s infancy. The blood is placed on the Name Roll as a testament to who this child truly is. It doesn’t matter whether the father is named or not. The magic depends on the blood of the mother and her blood will testify to how she conceived this child. The truth may never be known and the Name Roll doesn’t have to name the father. But it always names the mother and it may even call to the blood of the father’s mother (because this is how the Roll recognizes the father). All the Roll has to do is attest that this child exists and was born to this woman. Magical blood adoptions cannot happen without them. Because the magic always demands the truth. It doesn’t have to tell it; but it always demands it.

**Can you tell that the Name Roll was invented by women?** The midwives and matriarchs created them as a way to codify and remember what they themselves can personally attest to. These attestations were sworn under blood oath. They were deeply solemn and abusing or breaking them invited catastrophic magical backlash, public or private. However, for various reasons including war (the conquests of the Roman Empire; the coming of Christianity; the invasions of the Danes, Angles and Saxons, etc.) they decided they needed a way to record the births in case those who could attest to it died or were otherwise lost. Because otherwise there would be no way to establish one’s true identify if one became a foundling or contested an inheritance.

**Where the Name Rolls were kept, I don’t know.** As with a horcrux, locations could vary. They could be kept in homes, within the midwife’s cottage, in temples and later churches (those sympathetic to wizards and witches) after the temples were closed. They could even be buried. It doesn’t matter. The structure of the magic of the Name Rolls is such that they can ALWAYS be summoned by the individual or descendent of the individual whom the Name Roll registers. The blood calls to the blood. In some ways, the Name Roll is magically analogous to blood. So all the person has to do to establish their magical identity once and for all is to summon the Name Roll.

 

**So Here is How We Identify Harry  
** When Lily used blood magic to hide Harry’s true parentage, she had to create a Name Roll. (Remember Name Rolls are created and administered by the midwives and the mothers.) That Name Roll STILL EXISTS. In Harry’s case, it was fused with the Motherward spell because my unnamed hag claimed him as the instrument of the foremothers’ agenda.

**Why would they choose Harry?** Because of his positioning. Unlike Neville, he was particularly important to Dumbledore, the so-called Light Wizard, because SEVERUS sired Harry. And the mothers/foremothers know who Severus is. Severus occupies a special place. He is the instrument of both the Light Wizard – Dumbledore – and the Dark Wizard – Voldemort – and thus is the middle ground between both. In many ways, the true battle is being fought through Severus. Siring a son (a daughter would have worked too but had powers and options different from what Harry had) now creates a new instrument, something of a blank state, for the mothers to use to help end this conflict and the power of these wizards once and for all.

Harry has NO idea. Neither does Severus. Lily, James and certainly Dumbledore don’t. Harry (along with Severus) is going to be used as a wedge to dislodge this power structure once and for all.

So the first thing is to establish Harry’s name, his true and foundational magical identity. The Name Roll names Harry for who he is and can list several names. His full names are: 

  * **_Harold James Potter_ ** – his legal, Ministry-recognized name. Harold is Anglo-Saxon and the name of the last Saxon king before the Norman invasion. It’s a name that has a respectable lineage within the Potter ancestry. 
  * **_Hadrian Puer Princeps_ ** – this is his Old Magic name; it’s chosen from Severus’ family line and his surnames come from the maiden names of his mother and his paternal grandmother rendered in Latin. Lily came up with this name on the spot in order to fulfill the conditions of getting the spell done. Lily wanted to keep the name as close to Harry as she could get while still honoring Severus’ line. Whether she wanted to honor Severus’ line is immaterial. The spell required it.
  * **_Handbana Moddrene or The Hand of the Mothers_ ** – this is the name bestowed on him by the woman from Sutt Hill Alley. She was a representative of the foremothers and empowered to enact their will. On the one hand, it could mean that he was the instrument of the Mothers. On the other hand, it could mean that the hand of the mothers is on him so he is protected.



 THIS is what protected him from Voldemort’s attack, not Lily’s sacrifice which is what any mother would have done. And it cannot be duplicated because:

  1. **_It had the full force of the foremothers behind it.  
_**
  2. **_The current wizard world denies that power.  
_**
  3. **_As a result, the current wizard world DISMISSES that power and no longer knows how to use it or how it works._**



  
This is why neither Dumbledore nor Voldemort could explain how Harry survived that curse. Dumbledore was able to figure out that it had to do with Harry’s mother. He thought it was simply a mother’s love. So did Voldemort. Please. It was about the Mothers’ POWER, a power that has been suppressed, degraded and denied for millennia. It’s coming back and they better be ready.

 

**FIN**

**Author's Note:**

> _"Handbana Moddrene" is my clumsy attempt to translate "The Hand of the Mothers" into Old English using the online Old English translator at https://www.oldenglishtranslator.co.uk I can't tell you if I was successful. If anybody knows Old English or better Anglo-Saxon (aren't they the same thing?) please let me know._
> 
> _"Harold" I chose instead of "Henry" because Harold was the last Anglo-Saxon king before William the Conqueror swiped the English part of the British Isles. I thought it made more sense for Harry._
> 
> _"Puer" comes from the etymology I found for the name "Evans". Apparently, Evan is an anglicized version of the Gaelic "Eoghan" which means "youth". So I used the Latin word for "youth"._


End file.
